Nova

The sun is our life-giving source of light, heat, and energy, and new discoveries are unraveling its epic history. Join NOVA on a spectacular voyage to discover its place in a grand cycle of birth, death and renewal that makes this the age of stars.

Voyage to discover the sun’s place in a grand cycle of birth, death and renewal.

NOVA Universe Revealed: Age of Stars

The most massive, luminous stars have the shortest lifetimes. Here's why—and how they burn out.

The saying "live fast, die young" applies to stars, astrophysicist Grant Tremblay says.

How a Star Dies in a Supernova

NOVA Universe Revealed: Age of Stars Preview

The chance of a star being born today is much lower than it was in the universe's past. Here's why—and how astronomers predict the age of stars will someday come to an end.

The age of stars is not as enduring as it might seem.

Will the Universe's Stars Someday Disappear?

The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation

Koch Foundation

NOVA Science Trust Logo

The sun is our life-giving source of light, heat, and energy, and new discoveries are unraveling its epic history. Join NOVA on a spectacular voyage to discover the sun’s place in a grand cycle of birth, death and renewal that makes this the age of stars. Witness how stars of every size and color came to populate our universe; how stars stage a dramatic exit when they explode as supernovae, which can outshine an entire galaxy; and how, billions of years in the future, the age of stars will lead ultimately to an age of darkness. (Premiered October 27, 2021)

Join NOVA on a voyage to discover the life and death cycle of the sun and other stars.

Cfa | Harvard & Smithsonian

Harvard University

Join NOVA on a voyage to discover the life and death cycle of the sun and other stars.

Space & Flight

Straddling the night sky, the Milky Way reminds us of our place in the galaxy we call home. But what shaped this giant spiral of stars and what will be its destiny? NOVA travels back in time to unlock the turbulent story of our cosmic neighborhood.

Explore the wonders and mysteries of our galaxy—the giant city of stars we call home.

NOVA Universe Revealed: Milky Way

Astronomers estimate that in about 4.5 billion years, the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies will collide. Here's how it'll happen.

The Milky Way as we know it today is not eternal.

The Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies will Someday Collide

Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies will Someday Collide

NOVA Universe Revealed: Milky Way Preview

Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has allowed scientists to peer deep into space and far back in time to understand the diversity of galaxies in our universe.

The Hubble Space Telescope has revolutionized our understanding of the universe.

Gaze at Galaxies with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope

Straddling the night sky, the Milky Way reminds us of our place in the galaxy we call home. But what shaped this giant spiral of stars and what will be its destiny? NOVA travels back in time to unlock the turbulent story of our cosmic neighborhood, from its birth in a whirling disk of clouds and dust to colossal collisions with other galaxies. Finally, peer into the future to watch the Milky Way’s ultimate fate as it collides with the Andromeda galaxy, over 4 billion years from now. (Premiered November 3, 2021)

Explore the wonders and mysteries of our galaxy—the giant city of stars we call home.

Exoplanets like OGLE-2005-BLG-390Lb, aka Hoth, seem to defy the logic of our solar system. So scientists needed to rethink the planetary rulebook.

No one predicted that planets like this were even possible.

Yes, There's Really a Frozen Exoplanet named Hoth

Ultra-sensitive telescopes have transformed alien planet-hunting from science fiction into enthralling hard fact. Join NOVA on a visit to exotic worlds orbiting distant suns to answer an age-old question with thrilling new science: are we alone?

Visit exotic worlds orbiting distant suns as NOVA tackles the big question: are we alone?

NOVA Universe Revealed: Alien Worlds

Science fiction got some things right: On worlds in binary star systems, there are always two shadows and two sunsets.

What would life be like in a binary star system?

In Galaxies Far, Far Away, Some Planets Have Two Stars

NOVA Universe Revealed: Alien Worlds Preview

It’s an age-old question: are we alone? Or do other lifeforms and intelligences thrive on worlds far beyond our own? Ultra-sensitive telescopes and dogged detective work are transforming alien planet-hunting from science fiction into hard fact. Join NOVA on a visit to exotic worlds orbiting distant suns, from puffy planets with the density of Styrofoam to thousand-degree, broiling gas giants. Most tantalizing of all are the Super-Earths in the “Goldilocks zone,” just the right distance from their sun to support life, and with one of them signaling life’s essential ingredient, water, in its atmosphere. Are we on the brink of answering that haunting question. (Premiered November 10, 2021)

Visit exotic worlds orbiting distant suns as NOVA tackles the big question: are we alone?

A supermassive black hole sits at the center of the Milky Way galaxy, scientists believe. Would life as we know it exist without this invisible enigma?

Scientists believe a giant black hole sits at the center of our galaxy.

Sagittarius A*: The Void at the Center of our Galaxy

Take a seat on the ultimate thrill ride to explore nature’s strangest and most powerful objects. Discover new science showing how black holes reshape entire galaxies, warp the fabric of space and time, and might even be portals to another universe.

Take a seat on the ultimate thrill ride as NOVA explores the universe’s strangest objects.

NOVA Universe Revealed: Black Holes

See the amazing view from a planet being consumed by a supermassive black hole, and why the universe would appear distorted in both time and space.

Black holes distort the space-time fabric.

Take a Ride into a Supermassive Black Hole

NOVA Universe Revealed: Black Holes Preview

Take a seat on the ultimate thrill ride to explore nature’s strangest and most powerful objects. Black holes can reshape entire galaxies, warp the fabric of space and time, and may even be the key to unlocking the ultimate nature of reality. A new generation of high-energy telescopes is bringing these invisible voids to light, showing that “supermassives” millions or billions of times larger than our sun lurk at the center of nearly every galaxy, including our own. But what happens if you stray too close to one? And what lies beyond the black hole’s abyss? If nothing can ever escape it, is that the end of the story? Or could they be a portal to another dimension—or another universe, full of black holes? (Premiered November 17, 2021)

Director, Event Horizon Telescope

University of Maryland

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Yale University

Take a seat on the ultimate thrill ride as NOVA explores the universe’s strangest objects.

Feast your eyes on one of the most important images in all of cosmology: a picture of the first light from the Big Bang.

Scientists now have a detailed image of the entire universe in its infancy.

Scientists Capture the First Light from the Big Bang

The Big Bang is when the cosmos started and time itself began. With stunning animation based on space telescope images, NOVA winds back the ages to discover new clues about this ultimate genesis and what happened in the universe’s first few seconds.

Venture back to the birth of space and time as NOVA probes the mystery of the Big Bang.

NOVA Universe Revealed: Big Bang

NOVA Universe Revealed: Big Bang Preview

The Big Bang was less of an explosion than a transformation of energy into matter.

Energy transformed into matter during the Big Bang.

Was the Big Bang an Explosion or Something Else?

The Big Bang is when many think the universe started and time itself began. But what clues can we discover about this ultimate genesis of everything? And can we ever know what existed before the Universe’s birthday? With stunning animation based on space telescope images, NOVA explores infant galaxies filled with violent blue stars that formed just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. Before that—before the coming of visible light itself—stretch the “cosmic Dark Ages.” But scientists haven’t stopped there; instead, they’ve come up with an incredible theory for what happened billionths of a billionth of a second from the universe’s birth. If they’re right, we’re on the brink of understanding more than we could ever have hoped about our cosmic origins.

Venture back to the birth of space and time as NOVA probes the mystery of the Big Bang.

In this five-part series, NOVA delves into the vastness of space to capture moments of high drama when the universe changed forever. State-of-the-art animation gives us astonishing, photorealistic glimpses of the birth of a star in a stellar nursery, the chaos created as two galaxies collide, and the power of a supermassive black hole as it flings a star across space so violently that it’s still traveling 10 million years later. NOVA even takes viewers back on the ultimate time travel voyage, to witness the birth of space and time itself. Informed by huge advances in scientific understanding, the series brings us face-to-face with the most surprising characters in the cosmos and reveals how their fates are intertwined with our own. Take a ringside seat for the greatest show in the universe. (Premiered October 27, 2021)

Take a ringside seat as NOVA captures moments of high drama when the cosmos changed forever.

In this five-part series, NOVA delves into the vastness of space to capture moments of high drama when the universe changed forever. State-of-the-art animation gives us astonishing, photorealistic glimpses of the birth of a star in a stellar nursery, the chaos created as two galaxies collide, and the power of a supermassive black hole as it flings a star across space.

Take a ringside seat as NOVA captures moments of high drama when the cosmos changed.

NOVA Universe Revealed Series Teaser

Take a ringside seat as NOVA captures moments of high drama when the cosmos changed forever.

Explore NOVA Universe Revealed

Explore More

How Dust Built the Universe

How to Find an Exoplanet

Signals From the First Stars Could Show Hints of Dark Matter

NOVA Universe Revealed: Black Holes

NOVA Universe Revealed: Alien Worlds

NOVA Universe Revealed: Milky Way

NOVA Universe Revealed: Age of Stars

NOVA Universe Revealed

NOVA Universe Revealed: Big Bang

Big Bang May Have Created a Mirror Universe Where Time Runs Backwards

What's the Universe Made Of?

Brilliant Blunders: How the Big Bang Beat Out the Steady State Universe

The Planets

Janna Levin: What's So Funny About The Big Bang Theory?

The Fabric of the Cosmos

How a Star Dies in a Supernova

The Elegant Universe

Ancient Philosophers Help Scientists Decode Brightest Supernova on Record

In a first, astronomers find a potential planet outside the Milky Way

Search for Exoplanets with the NOVA Exoplanet Lab

Will the Universe's Stars Someday Disappear?

Astronomers watch a star explode in real time

Yes, There's Really a Frozen Exoplanet named Hoth

Gaze at Galaxies with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope

The Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies will Someday Collide

10 spectacular Hubble Space Telescope images

Sagittarius A: The Void at the Center of our Galaxy

Deep learning tool helps NASA discover 301 exoplanets

Take a Ride into a Supermassive Black Hole

Was the Big Bang an Explosion or Something Else?

Scientists Capture the First Light from the Big Bang

In Galaxies Far, Far Away, Some Planets Have Two Stars

OSIRIS-REx is bringing back an asteroid sample. What now?